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Standing at attention for the National Anthem

One reason I stand for the National Anthem consists in this: that in our country, peaceful protest against and symbolic defiance of the Executive is not punishable at law.

The Chief Executive may make an ass of himself, unburdening on us all his idiot musings on patriotism, the flag, and the honor due to the nation; he may even recommend vulgarly that such defiance be treated punitively by those private employers paying these defiers: and yet his views, substantively, mean little. The Chief Executive’s views cannot even effect a private penalty for defiance.

Over the course of most of human history, even symbolic defiance of the authorities, and a fortiori the Chief Executive’s authority, would have been met with 2am arrest and confinement without trial to a rotten dungeon. Or, if you were a great noble, knight, seignior, or grandee, it would have been met with war.

So a reason I stand at attention for our National Anthem, is that Our Lord has blessed me, and so shown kindness to his wayward son, as to permit me to live in such a country. That liberty was not won easily, nor is it preserved easily. President Washington spoke in his Thanksgiving Proclamation of the “signal favors of Almighty God” to America; and among them is the liberty of protest peaceful.

For there is much, all too much, deserving of strenuous protest in our land.

Whether ostentatiously declining to stand at attention for the National Anthem at a football game, amounts to a wise use of that liberty, or a fitting response to that signal favor, is a question I leave aside for the moment.

What I do not leave aside is what I feel is my duty to emphasize as a profound fact, for which most of us, when we think hard on it, have gratitude:

In our country the ill-mannered bluster of the Chief Executive has no real force. The President stated that peaceful protestors during the National Anthem should be fired: and almost no one for even a moment imagined that it would be so. The Rooney family is going to fire Mike Tomlin and Antonio Brown? Arthur Blank is going to fire Julio Jones? Laughable.

Comments (27)

Good point, Paul.

In contrast, those who yearn for a return to powerful monarchy might ponder the fate of Hubert de Burgh in 1231 under Henry III. Previously a regent (in the king's minority) and close counselor to the young king, de Burgh simply fell from favor because a rival of his got the ear of the king and inspired him to punish de Burgh, wildly accusing him of all manner of things, most of them false. De Burgh was hounded from pillar to post, hounded even out of sanctuary, and in great danger of his life, until he was freed by a group of rebelling earls. He was shakily restored to the king's favor temporarily but was once again in grave danger (though never so blatantly) a few years later when it emerged that his wife had arranged a secret marriage for his daughter to the valuable young heir, Richard of Gloucester, without his or the king's knowledge or consent. The king implied that de Burgh had arranged it in defiance of the conditions of his own restoration to favor, and de Burgh only got out of another unpleasant imprisonment by implying to the king and lords that perhaps the marriage was invalid and that he could not attest to its validity.

The point of all of this is that the mere whims of a notoriously childish, unreliable, and vindictive king were, literally, deadly. Which is not a model for good government.

The moment I heard that there were widespread anthem protests in response to Trump's comments, I knew (well, I could reasonably surmise with high confidence) that he had made himself an ass. Again. And again and again. Well, that part was right. Any time you have reason to guess that Trump made an ass of himself, the betting money is on "yes".

And my second thought was "everybody and his brother in the NFL will respond to Trump with comments almost as stupid as Trump's". Boy, I was right about that, too.

Players and unions were mouthing off about Trump's incursions on "Constitutional rights", when (just to pick one fact out of the hat), the NBA has requirements for anthem behavior, and nobody gets after the NBA for violating free speech.

I don't know if Trump realizes that even if he had 2 or 3 club owners on his side (more or less) about the basic issue, he has effectively made it impossible for any club to do anything about the protests, other than make official room for them somehow? Talk about backfiring.

That President Trump said something stupid doesn't mean that Goodell or the NFLPA said something right. I find it appalling that nobody in officialdom around the league seems to have had the right thing to say. Or, at least, it wasn't publicized - for which we have our delightful media to thank. Who is willing to bet that the media is trying to make a bigger 'to do' out of this than any of the participants actually think it warrants - except maybe Kaepernick. I don't know if Kaepernick is getting what he deserves. But if the reason no team wanted to pay him 10M a year was that, in addition to not producing on the field, he wouldn't sell tickets, and he wouldn't sell jerseys and other items, and he wouldn't generate good TV ratings, and he would be divisive within the organization, then I would say that yes, he is getting what comes from doing something stupid and public and wrong-headed and socially disordered. And if, similarly, no advertizers pick him up because they are finding their customers don't want to have anything to do with a public figure who repeatedly does something stupid and public and wrong-headed and socially disordered, then there again he would be getting the correct social feedback.

I hate the evils America bears under her saddle. She isn't perfect. But she is good enough to stand up for.

This will be a big win for President Trump. Nobody in their right state of mind views disrespecting the flag and trashing the country as protesting Trump. Trump says "respect the country" and the response is "hell no". It's brilliant.

I think the Dallas Cowboys figured out the right formula, kneel before the anthem and then lock arms during the anthem. To paraphrase someone else, when athletes takes a knee in many different sports it is to indicate a seriously wounded player. Kaepernick's action can be interpreted in a similar way applied to wounded citizens.

In 1943 Justice Robert Jackson wrote in the landmark case on reciting the pledge of allegiance in schools: “To believe that patriotism will not flourish if patriotic ceremonies are voluntary and spontaneous, instead of a compulsory routine, is to make an unflattering estimate of the appeal of our institutions to free minds.”

I think the Dallas Cowboys figured out the right formula, kneel before the anthem and then lock arms during the anthem.

I liked the fact that they stood for the anthem. I liked that even while linking arms, many of them had their hands over their hearts. If they felt that kneeling before meant something, good for them - if it meant something good, anyway.

To paraphrase someone else, when athletes takes a knee in many different sports it is to indicate a seriously wounded player. Kaepernick's action can be interpreted in a similar way applied to wounded citizens.

It can be interpreted 10,000 different ways, because actions of that sort are indeterminate. But the primary way it "can be interpreted" is the way that he apparently meant it, which he clarified by words, which was to decline to participate in the symbolism of honoring the flag and the nation it stands for.

I don't assume that the Cowboys kneeling meant the same thing Kaepernick did. If they did, they would come under the same censure he rightly came in for. If they meant something different, it's up to them to tell us. The only thing I have heard so far was something mumble mummble bumble "unity and solidarity." Well, unity is GOOD when the everyone is going in the right direction. If everyone is headed off a cliff, unity and "going with the team" is stupid. It isn't a positive good all by itself independent of other facts.

In 1943 Justice Robert Jackson wrote in the landmark case on reciting the pledge of allegiance in schools: “To believe that patriotism will not flourish if patriotic ceremonies are voluntary and spontaneous, instead of a compulsory routine, is to make an unflattering estimate of the appeal of our institutions to free minds.”

The point of them not being "compulsory" is that there is no law about them, not that there is no custom about them.

We don't decide by law which things will grow up to have customs about them over time. I am sure the Romans did not stand in a row with their hands over their hearts while the Roman anthem was played. It's a modern custom for certain communal events (not all). It's not mandatory in the way law is, it is obligatory in the way custom is - especially in that the custom touches directly on the virtue of patriotism. You live in a culture, which by definition has customs. When the customs are noble and wholesome, you have obligations about those customs, you are not morally free to simply ignore them if they don't strike your fancy. (Similarly, words and customary actions have meanings granted to them by long-standing convention. You don't get to decide what meaning a long-standing word shall have - contrary to customary usage - when its old meaning is not pleasing to you.)

"Spontaneous" and "custom" are two divergent categories, and Justice Robert Jackson's comments (besides the nonsense about "compulsory") are hopelessly muddled in trying to combine them.

I don't know if Trump realizes that even if he had 2 or 3 club owners on his side (more or less) about the basic issue, he has effectively made it impossible for any club to do anything about the protests, other than make official room for them somehow? Talk about backfiring.

If disrespecting the flag in the NFL were to have been stopped without Trumps involvement, how would that have benefited him personally? In order to speak of 'backfiring' you have to assume that what Trump really cares about is whether the flag is respected at football games. But I assume what he really cares about is what benefits himself. Making himself look to the average voter (he's not appealing to us genteel folks) like the biggest fighter against the left while simultaneously provoking the left to announce loudly how unpatriotic they are ... that is the effect of what he has done, and it potentially does benefit him. Asinine it may be, but given what I assume his goals are, I can't see it as stupid.

Tony,Well, unity is GOOD when the everyone is going in the right direction.

Trump is a demagogue who finds some very fine people marching with groups carrying Nazi and Confederate flags – clearly a superb demonstration of patriotism and profound respect for Old Glory. His latest bit of rage theater has had all the subtlety of screaming "Shiny Object!"

When the customs are noble and wholesome, you have obligations about those customs, you are not morally free to simply ignore them if they don't strike your fancy.

To protest injustice in such a way is not a trivial matter of not striking someone's fancy. “‘My country, right or wrong,’ is a thing that no patriot would think of saying. It is like saying, ‘My mother, drunk or sober.’” — G. K. Chesterton

Christopher, I have to admit there is a kind of cad-like sense to it the way you offer. But since Trump constantly does things that really don't have a lick of sense to them in the long run (even for his own personal objectives, that is), I would still have to doubt whether HE had that much thought in it. More likely, he just lashed out at something that strikes him, and devil-may-care whether it really does further his ultimate goals. (Which, for his friends on the alt-right, is just exactly why they like him.) For one thing, until his remarks, he probably really did have at least one or two owners downright uncomfortable with the protests. Now he's made full-on enemies of them.

"But since Trump constantly does things that really don't have a lick of sense to them in the long run (even for his own personal objectives, that is)."

Trump, who is an idiot savant (he is clearly in the early stages of some form of dementia so instinct is large here) when it comes to reading crowds, read the crowd and saw he was losing them on Strange so he pivoted and threw them some red meat. As he was in the heart of the Confederacy and as any Trump rally is just a few bed sheets and a coil of rope away from being a mob the topic makes sense. Also recall that Trump is still miffed at losing the Bills and his screw-up with the USA league so firing on the owners (who are actually successful businessmen) is a bonus.

No one expects anyone to be fired but we just had an American president go down South and go well beyond the usual Republican racial dog whistle.

When considering the "long run" we should keep in mind that the US is well on the way to being a minority ruled nation and Trump gets this. Almost half the nation lives in forty states which means that half the nation controls eighty per cent of the Senate as well as a decided advantage in the Electoral College. Perhaps the Constitution is a suicide pact after all.

The coach of the Denver Broncos, Vance Joseph: “My view hasn’t changed with this,” he said Monday. “I believe in standing for the anthem. That’s just my personal belief. I was raised that way. I believe in that. The flag and the anthem mean a lot to me as far the freedoms that we endure everyday as U.S. citizens. It’s important for me to stand. But that being said, our players have a right to a peaceful protest. That’s their right as U.S. citizens.

“But hopefully we can move past this and play football because politics and football don’t mix, in my opinion, and I’m a football coach, they’re football players and our job is to win football games. Hopefully, we can get back to that this week.”

“It should not be a part of what we’re doing on Sundays. That’s my personal opinion,” Joseph said. “But, again, I don’t think it’s a big deal once the football is kicked and snapped. It’s about the best teams playing the best football that day and winning the football game. That’s what it’s about.”

The fact that the NFL did not have the gumption and common sense to express patriotic affirmations,including the right to protest, as did Vance Joseph, will hurt them deeply.

Many miss the fact that Trump, as always badly and bombastically, tapped into the disappointment and anger being felt by many fans for being forced to witness offensive treatment of the symbols of unity of this great country. For the political, the fans mean nothing, in fact they generally mock them as probable Trump voters, and they have no interest in football, in fact most hate football. They do like spend their time bashing the infinitely and justifiably bash able Trump who once again has been underestimated.

Yet nobody has a moral right to do something morally wrong. What should be patently obvious to everyone over the age of 10 becomes muddled in confusion, because public officials won't bother themselves to speak the truth, because people focus on one point and ignore others.

Kaepernick, and the rest of the players have both a legal AND moral right to protest wrongs. Indeed, using their public personae to do so has a kind of moral fittingness. Kaepernick and the other players and coaches, ought not to have protested by inappropriate, inordinate, confused and malicious actions. They ought not commit offenses against the moral virtue that demands proper love of country, in order to protest evils. A good goal does not justify bad means. A fitting goal cannot be well achieved by disordered acts that oppose virtue. They should instead (once having decided to protest evils) have decided to protest in a manner fitting to the objective, in a manner fitting to the love of country that they should have and should be willing to show in customary manner. If they believe, fairly, that the evils they wish to protest damage their country, they should not protest those evils by being vicious toward that very country. How can being vicious toward her support fixing her?

Love of one's nation and filial honor for her is not merely one of the "optional extras" that we are free to accept or reject if we feel like it. It is a specific positive moral virtue, just as are piety, honoring your parents, and gratitude to those who have done you good.

The principles (or origins) of our being and governing are our parents and our country, which have given us birth and nourishment. Consequently man is debtor chiefly to his parents and his country, after God. Wherefore, just as it belongs to religion to give worship to God, so does it belong to "pietas," in the second place, to give worship to one's parents and one's country. (Summa Theologica, 2a, 2ae, Q. 101)

While due acts of "pietas" will take different forms in different situations, intentionally repudiating a particular customary norm regarding that piety precisely because one does not want to honor the country is, per se, contrary to the virtue.

Much as I admire Coach Vance Joseph for speaking his mind respectfully, I cannot agree with his confused analysis. If the players WERE MORALLY RIGHT to exercise their legal permission to protest by carrying protest into Sunday and onto the ball field and into the singing of the anthem, then there is no clear reason why they would be wrong to continue that protest into the game itself. Surely the evils they have set their minds on is a more important matter than a GAME. A mere game. Politics, like morals, encompasses behavior on the ball field in the middle of a huge crowd, just like it encompasses the behavior in other places: politics is the work of morals on the stage of the common good. It cannot be separated out as the behavior we engage in at the polling place only, any more than morality can be separated out as the behavior we only engage in at church or when our friends are looking (any more than playing football is something free of moral content, as I am sure Coach Joseph would agree).

What the good coach rightly grasped was that the ball field was NOT the proper venue for the protest, and while wrong and limited only to the period of playing the anthem the wrong behavior could be tolerated, whereas if it were to invade the game itself the entire raison d'etre of the event would be cut off at the ankles and both the game AND the cause they seek to aid would lose. That's true. We can indeed tolerate the wrong behavior of the anthem protests. In especial, we can tolerate them without legal penalties. But this does not imply that they are therefore justified, or good, or to be praised.

I agree with you. I read Coach Joseph to say he was acknowledging their constitutional right to protest. He was not delving into moral rights. I think he expressed pretty well what the NFL should have said. Although, it would have been better to have added that he felt it was wrong to protest.

When considering the "long run" we should keep in mind that the US is well on the way to being a minority ruled nation and Trump gets this. Almost half the nation lives in forty states which means that half the nation controls eighty per cent of the Senate as well as a decided advantage in the Electoral College. Perhaps the Constitution is a suicide pact after all.

I was trying to see what good ol' al was saying about "almost half the nation" and then I got it: he's creating a Yogi Berra-ism, like 80% of the game is half mental. Almost most of the nation lives in most of the states.

Coming off of 8 years in which the Dems had the presidency, and a 24 year period in which they had the presidency for 16 years, it's a pretty funny comment. It's also pretty funny when in 2015 the opinion of 5 people who live in DC, VA, and MD outweighed the opinion of 60% of the nation and 40 states (on whether gays can "marry"), and liberals across the land partied up the rule of that particular minority over that of the majority. It seems that liberals like the rule of the minority some of the time and detest it as undemocratic other times. Good way to stand on principle, there. Love it.

(4) Conservatives have a blind spot for the police for reasons that are mystifying. Conservatives, after all, are hugely distrustful of government authority. Someone from the IRS or the EPA bosses citizens around and deprives them of their property and conservatives freak out.

But call that agent of the government a cop, give him a gun, the authority to kill, and a public sector union devoted to ensuring he faces zero accountability? Suddenly only racial agitators and liberal namby-pambies question his actions.

[. . .]

(9) All of that said, qua protest, the Star-Spangled kneel-down is probably the most respectful form of protest, ever. Football players aren't turning their backs on the flag. They're not raising the black-power fist. Kneeling is reverent. It's what we do at the most solemn moments in church. As Gabriel Malor puts it, the tenor of the protest isn’t that America is bad or evil: “they're kneeling to indicate that America is in distress.”

Which was, come to think of it, the entire raison d'être of the Trump campaign.

We should wish that every protest movement was so thoughtful and humble in its expression.

Well, actually, in some cases at some games they did raise a fist. And while we can debate on whether they meant by it the same think as the Black Power fist of 1968 meant, the point is that nobody can prove what they meant specifically without, you know, their actually saying what they meant in words rather than in symbolic acts.

And the first of the protests was sitting down, not kneeling. Which is quite different. It is my sense that the players who started kneeling after Trump's infamous remarks realized innately that sitting is not an appropriate response to the situation, but that SOME kind of distinct response is.

As Gabriel Malor puts it, the tenor of the protest isn’t that America is bad or evil: “they're kneeling to indicate that America is in distress.”

And thank God for the ones who are kneeling to indicate that. But for some of them that's decidedly not their intent in protesting to begin with:

"I am not going to stand up to show pride in a flag for a country that oppresses black people and people of color,"

I applaud the desire of those who, realizing that sitting for the anthem really is dishonor to the nation and that they should not simply "take that sitting down", went out of their way to change the terms of the debate, especially the ones who explained their _symbolic_ actions by clear statements that their intent both accepted the principle of honoring the flag and also respected the need to think of the larger picture which includes fellow citizens suffering.

The point that some are missing is that you cannot DECIDE by yourself, in a vacuum, what your actions will mean symbolically when you choose to controvert customary norms of social symbols. Unless some special circumstance intervenes, they automatically mean something like "rejection of the symbolic meaning of the norms". Now, they can TRY to instigate a new norm that did not mean something like rejection of the meaning of the old norm, but only by explicitly saying something like "not only do I not intend to reject honor to the flag and to the nation it stands for, by kneeling I intend to honor both that flag and to the people of this nation that have been dissed and ignored, who are hurting..." Because it is true that kneeling has its own positive symbolic meaning of giving honor, so that kneeling cannot be simply understood as "the negation of the honor indicated by standing". But some of the early protests were sitting down during the anthem. And no, sitting has nothing of the symbolic meaning of honoring. So it would have been flat out ridiculous for those sitting athletes to suggest that "not only did I intend to honor the nation for which our flag stands..."

Last's article is very good on his main point, too: that there is a real evil that needs attention, that of the cover-ups and brushing under the rug of unconscionable police behavior, both the actual violent behavior and the threats of it, that have no justifying basis at all and should have resulted in firings and criminal convictions.

NSM. As with his previous inability to understand how the 3/5 compromise gave the slave states an advantage in the electoral college, Tony seems to have some sort of mental block when it comes to understanding demographics and our constitution.

This is really simple: If slightly under a majority live in an overwhelming majority of the states, that minority has the potential to control the Senate as well as skewing the EC. This was merely a potential problem when the parties were more regional then ideological and the country was less urbanized. Ideological and geographic sorting coupled with sophisticated IT has allowed the matter to mature nationally as well as within the states.

We now have a situation where Republicans can get legislative majorities with a minority of the votes and super majorities with bare majorities. We also have the Leninist faction of that party, one apparently working with a foreign power, selecting a president and seeking to more fully control that party. What could go wrong?

This is really simple: If slightly under a majority live in an overwhelming majority of the states, that minority has the potential to control the Senate as well as skewing the EC.

Oh, I understood the "slightly under a majority" business. But in spite of the "forty states" comment, the actual red - blue break-down is not nearly that cut and dried. There is no 40-state bloc voting one way consistently. These maps (presidential) by NY Times depicts red states as being 22.

More importantly, states move around, change their colors. Pennsylvania and Michigan "are red", for the next 60 seconds. On Nov. 1 a lot of people said they were blue. Would you guarantee they will vote red after Trump (inevitably) does some crazy thing in the next 13 months? 15 years ago VA was solidly red, then it went "purple", now it's blue. NC is now going through the same process.

We also have the Leninist faction of that party,

Please, let's be a little more careful here. We have a "know nothing" faction of Trump's party, and a Leninist faction (complete with masks and clubs) of the other party. My hope is that they will face off (hockey term, very apropos) and put each other in permanent traction, and leave the rest of us to be adults.

Well, among other things, the progressive Left could go on freebasing on sanctimony and abjuring all self-reflection. Trump has been a major public figure since Back to the Future came out when I was seven years old; he was regular in Manhattan society for close to four decades; and yet the Manhattan elite appear to pride themselves on their sagacity for discovering that he is a bully and a clown as early as 2015. Even right now, progressives are busying themselves with encomia for a dirtbag misogynist like Hugh Hefner, while simultaneously preening their self-righteous #Resistance to another dirtbag misogynist, who somehow managed to win the White House.

As for this "working with a foreign power" business, the week just past revealed that, by the logic of these feeble insinuations we ought to say that Jill Stein, Bernie Sanders and Black Lives Matter were all working with the same foreign power. I suppose it was the Russians who convinced Hillary Clinton to ignore Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.

Al's sad-sack whining about demographics was, in fact, and despite his protests, ably mocked by Tony. Perhaps, instead of annoying us here in our little corner of the internet, Al's time would be better spent persuading his Democratic friends to, let us say, avoid running candidates for Senate in Alabama who proudly announce on TV that they support abortion right up to the moment of birth. Otherwise, he should steel himself for a lot more Roy Moores in the legislatures of this country.

Tony, your links are non-responsive to my point which deals with the problematic nature of the hard-wired parts of our Constitution and Congressional enabling legislation to representational legitimacy as mediated through our long term demographic trends and increasing ideological polarization.

Also, you can go to the page SCOTUSblog has on Gill v. Whitford and read the various briefs.

Googling "Sandy Levinson" and "constitutional rot" will also be useful.

"Please, let's be a little more careful here. We have a "know nothing" faction of Trump's party, and a Leninist faction (complete with masks and clubs) of the other party."

No, we have a racist and fascist faction of one party, full stop (to be fair I'll allow that while they most likely vote Republican, they aren't a part of that party in the sense the Young Republicans are). Antifa (I assume they are your contrasting party) isn't part of the Democratic Party but I think you actually know that. I assume that most of the hard and far left would consider Antifa to be hooligans and left deviationists. The rest of us see them as counterproductive fools. Knowing folks on the far left, I doubt that many (or any) of Antifa vote Democratic (or vote at all).

"Leninist" does not mean what you seem to think it does. Movement conservatism (and its political arm) displays many Leninist features as will any ideological movement that persists and prospers. Lenin did know his stuff. It is not for nothing that Bannon admires him.

"Would you guarantee they will vote red after Trump (inevitably) does some crazy thing in the next 13 months?"

It took two failed wars that were initiated under dubious circumstances, Katrina, and the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression as well as an extraordinarily gifted candidate on the other side to get rid of the Republicans last time. I don't think you appreciate the scale that "crazy" needs to reach. If I had children, I wouldn't be so sanguine about that route as a solution.

Paul:

Running ads for someone doesn't automatically indicate a conspiracy. Looking at our present examples I would venture the following:

1. Running ads for Sanders makes sense tactically but there seems to be no evidence that Sanders or anyone in his campaign was involved. As at least some of these ads were run after the primaries, helping Trump would seem to be their purpose.

2. Stein is a loon and I believe that she was at the same Moscow dinner as Flynn, so who knows? Did I mention she's a loon? Anyway a vote for Stein was constructively a vote for Trump in many jurisdictions (the "consumerist" voting model recently propounded by Tony and Lydia involves a deeply flawed and destructive theory of politics) so she's either a useful idiot or a co-conspirator.

3. BLM would seem to be a useful (and likely unwitting) foil for Putin's goal of sowing dissension in other nations.

On the other hand, we have all sorts of evidence linking folks around the Trump campaign to various Russian interests and contacts. Simply releasing those tax forms would really help here. Of course. if they were exculpatory would he not have already released them? You might want to check out the Senate Intel Committee presser this morning.

Regardless of either Trump or his campaign's involvement, we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that a foreign power was deeply involved at many levels in the past election.

"and yet the Manhattan elite appear to pride themselves on their sagacity for discovering that he is a bully and a clown as early as 2015."

Really? Perhaps the problem is that you don't get around much. Have you just told us that you are the typical low information voter? If you really believe that folks you term "elite" saw "The Donald" as anything but a grifter since like forever you are way behind the curve. Trump was a joke way before 2015. I recall him being roasted by Alan Abelson and others back in the 1990s. As for Hefner, it would help if you actually read progressives. The reaction has been mixed as was his life. Some of it has been scathing.

Jones needs to up his media game. On the one hand, Democratic consultants too often suck and letting your candidate not be briefed on the likely issues is malpractice. On the other hand, abortion isn't an important issue for most folks - including many if not most nominal "pro-lifers" (see below) - so he isn't the first to offer a stupid reply to the question.

(I'm sure you are aware of this item by now but it is hardly uncommon and explains why many folks see criminalization as elitist and class warfare.
This wasn't the first and it won't be the last:

"And you have zero issue posting your pro-life stance all over the place when you had no issue asking me to abort our unborn child just last week when we thought that was one of the options," Shannon Edwards, a forensic psychologist in Pittsburgh with whom the congressman admitted last month to having a relationship, wrote to Mr. Murphy on Jan. 25, in the midst of an unfounded pregnancy scare."

"Pro-life" Congressman Murphy replied in a text message:

"A text from Mr. Murphy’s cell phone number that same day in response says, "I get what you say about my March for life messages. I've never written them. Staff does them. I read them and winced. I told staff don't write any more. I will.'"

"I am sure that there isn't a single anti-abortion male who would object to an abortion if an inconvenient pregnancy happened. I also have no doubt that this is not a controversial opinion. Journalists always know more than what they say and they know this."

A little sweeping perhaps but the people voting on these things too often see themselves and others of "their sort" as above those laws. And journalists and others close to things really do know way more.)

I'm sure you are aware of this item by now but it is hardly uncommon and explains why many folks see criminalization as elitist and class warfare.
This wasn't the first and it won't be the last:...

"I am sure that there isn't a single anti-abortion male who would object to an abortion if an inconvenient pregnancy happened. I also have no doubt that this is not a controversial opinion. Journalists always know more than what they say and they know this."

Even though "do as I say, not as I do" is morally and socially odious, it hardly represents a basis for saying that the rule encapsulated in "as I say" is a bad rule.

In fact, if the fact that people are found to publicly promote a rule that they don't always follow WERE to show that the rule is bad, then there would be no good rules. And, since this lovable and refreshing facet of human nature is as old as the hills, there would never have been any good rules.

A little sweeping perhaps but the people voting on these things too often see themselves and others of "their sort" as above those laws. And journalists and others close to things really do know way more.)

Yeah, but then journalists are in the same boat of thinking themselves above the law - because they DO "know way more". Seems to rub off, as part of being "close to things".

I would just like to thank Al for this great and good public service he has rendered: Before I read his comment, it had never occurred to me that Republicans are often cynical and insincerely manipulative when it comes to their pro-life bona fides. The scales have truly fallen from my eyes. Before this very day, and absent Al's service, I assumed every last Republican politician shared my outrage at the impunity our laws grant to murderers of the unborn.

What next from this man's stock of astounding revelations -- that many prominent Hollywood liberals and champions of the cause of women are sexual predators? That many general officers are egotistical petty tyrants and lower officers automatons in the dreary Army bureaucracy? That many Jesuits openly scoff at the dogmas of Roman Catholicism?

~~On the other hand, abortion isn't an important issue for most folks - including many if not most nominal "pro-lifers"~~

In his recent book The Once and Future Liberal writer Mark Lilla declares that he is a fervent pro-choice supporter and that it is the issue he is most passionate about. In my 35+ years of paying attention to this issue, I have been given no reason to think that there are not an awful lot of liberals who would say the same thing as Lilla, or who think it while perhaps being not quite as vocal. It certainly seems to be a litmus test if one wants any cred in the Democratic Party. In other words, Al's statement is ludicrous.

By the way, Lilla's book is quite good otherwise and is well worth reading, irrespective of the fact that his pro-choice stance is inconsistent with his larger argument.

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